Snow. Boooo.

Rich has been full of cold this week so he decided to stay home on Saturday night rather than come with me on our night out with friends. I got home yesterday afternoon and it looked like father and daughter had a great bonding weekend. The house was a disaster but Flora and Rich survived which is all that matters. She is such a daddy’s girl. Rich gets kisses, hugs and cuddles all the time from her and I get a random kiss here and there. Yesterday she was delivering him kiss after kiss (looking at me between them just in case I missed how much she loves him....) and I finally thought I might get one as she crawled toward me with her mouth open......... nope, she wanted the dummy that I was holding.

We popped outside this morning so Flora could get a taste for our snowy world.

tickle tickle

Flora had a bit of a troubled sleep last night so I was up a fair bit. I think she has got a bit of a cold so that could have been the problem as she is normally a great sleeper.  Anyways, lovely Rich let me sleep in this morning so I had the luxury of getting her up from her first nap and seeing her sweet, rosy cheeks!

I finally got her saying “tickle tickle” on the video! She has been saying it for about a week now but today was the first time she did the actions with her hands. So cute!

I had an insanely busy day yesterday and was so tired at the end of it I decided to drink wine rather than blog about it. Selfish, I know.

I looked after Olivia for Joanne so she was with me from about 9:45 to 2:15. She is a delightful little thing and wasn’t any trouble at all BUT having to watch two little girls means you get even less done than normal. Kael, Pike, Boone, Mary, Thomas, Holly, Gunner and Tara came over for a visit and we managed to destroy the house in a couple of hours! Tara brought Flora her new car seat from the shop in Calgary and she loved it!

I am a little bit frightened of the weather outside at the minute and it isn’t even that cold yet. The view of the mountains yesterday morning was beautiful so I took a picture...from inside.

We kicked Tom and Pike out to the backyard!

What a stunner!

I got a few of the pictures from last weekend’s photo shoot with Kael. They are stunning. The whole disc is coming tomorrow and I can’t wait. She said it was hard just choosing a few to upload to her site http://firstlovephotography.blogspot.com/

Professor Kennedy

We went to Costco this morning to do a big grocery shop and then headed to the mall to check out new car seat options for Flora. I couldn’t resist trying these specs on the Professor.

Hours later and one 44 minute nap in the mall I am trying to catch up from my day out of the house and all I can hear is a little mumble monkey up in her room NOT napping. Some things never change.

more foreign language lessons from flora

We managed to get a couple good videos of Flora chatting away.

Foreign language

Flora has her own funny little language that I am always trying to catch on video. What I have ended up with is a lot of videos with me making a daft “goggly goggly goggly” noise. This video shows a tiny bit of her speaking. It is adorable and sometimes we can get into long, animated conversations with her “talking” like this.

Lazy start to the day, watching the toon match with Dad.

Big cuddles for Nini and her bunny.

We went to the farm yesterday to have a photo session with Kael. I am so excited to see what she has shot, the backdrops were amazing and the little model was on good form. Around 300 pictures later, Flora was worn out and we headed home!

Happy Birthday Ron!

Holly and I went and sat by the river with the kids. 

Gunner and Flora slept.

We got attacked by a few horses.

The party started! Boone is having a great time!

I got Ron a card that said “I was going to get all the family together to celebrate your birthday” ....“but I thought you might want to do something fun.”  I have to say it seemed a little fitting yesterday evening! There are so many of us (our immediate family, with children and spouses, is 18 people) in a small farmhouse that it can get a little loud and insane. My mom was busy taking pictures, not to remember the day fondly but to show the architect who is designing their new house how much space we take up!  It was a great time, though, and I think the birthday boy enjoyed himself.

New play area

I have had a busy morning making pommes de terre à la boulangère for Ron’s birthday dinner - fancy! We will be leaving early for the farm to meet Holly and Gunner for a walk. Hopefully the weather turns itself around, it looks miserable out. Time for winter coats, mittens and toques already!

I went to IKEA the other night to sort out some shelving for toys. Check out her new play area!

Look what Flora did yesterday!

There's a bear in the garden

nearly there!

Flora has been standing for about 2 weeks now. She isn’t ready to walk but we are hoping she decides to take that monumental first step soon!

We thought he was a goner but the dog came back

Rich and Jordon were watching New Zealand vs Australia yesterday so, sensibly, Flora and I fled to the farm. Vern decided to give my poor mom a scare and took off for the night and the better part of the day so we were all on a mission to find the silly dog. Luckily he crawled out from under a building around 2 so mom was able to enjoy the visit! Holly and Ben were out with Gunner who is insanely adorable. He is resisting Flora’s love at the minute but I think ultimately he will appreciate it when he realizes that her trying to poke at his eyes and scratch his head is genuine affection. Not even a hint of sarcasm there!

Chocolate and wine

On Friday we went to Calgary with Mary and Tom to get some books at Chapters. We stopped at Starbucks and Flora ate a ridiculously chocolaty biscuit. I was worried that she wouldn’t nap however when we got home she slept for a nearly record breaking 2hours and 20ish minutes. Flora may get fat as I plan on filling her with sugary treats on a regular basis now...

Yesterday we took all our bottles to the depot. My Escape was filled to the roof which is even more embarrassing than the usual trip as  we arrived at the recycling depot with a small child. You can see from this picture that Flora may take after her mother.

Also, check out her cute new Converse shoes!

Carstairs!

We spent the afternoon at Holly’s yesterday with Rachel, Aubrey, Kael, Boone, Pike, Amy, Nanton and Tina! Complete chaos so not sure a lot of visiting actually happened!

Copying Dad

We didn't get out to the farm yesterday so we spent the afternoon making soup and hanging out at home. This video is Flora copying Rich’s actions. She mimics a lot but it is very difficult to catch her in action on video! Yesterday she started to say “woof” but I haven’t been able to get her to do it for the camera!

No nap this morning!

Flora decided not to nap this morning, instead she crawled into the dishwasher.

I am feeling a little bored in Cochrane today so we are going to head out to the farm to spend the night with my parents.

raking leaves

Flora tried to eat the ladybug you see crawling up her arm. 

Thanksgiving

Perfect day for a Thanksgiving dinner with the family! We spent the day out at the west pasture and were very lucky to have nearly the entire family out. Flora enjoyed ham, turkey, cranberry sauce, gravy, mashed potato and even a bit of coffee courtesy of Auntie Candace!